Ex-Beatle Harrison to Release New Single

Former Beatle George Harrison has recorded his first single since being treated for cancer earlier this year, a music industry source said Wednesday.

Harrison, 58, co-wrote “A Horse to Water” with his son Dhani and recorded it with British musician Jools Holland.

“It was wonderful to work with one of the great, legendary artists in the world,” Holland said in a statement. “George suggested we do a track and this finally happened this month.”

Harrison recorded the song at home on Oct. 1, less than six months after undergoing radiotherapy for a brain tumor. He was treated for throat cancer in 1997.

A spokesman for Holland described the new song as a cross between 1960s Bob Dylan and early 1970s John Lennon. “It is not a ballad and it is not rock – I think George Harrison fans will be intrigued,” the spokesman added.

Harrison, the youngest Beatle, survived being stabbed in the chest by an intruder at his home in Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, west of London, in 1999.

He was widely reported to have moved to a luxury villa in the Swiss canton of Ticino in August as he recovered from the latest bout of surgery.

His single will appear on Holland’s album “Small World, Big Friends,” to be released in Britain on Nov. 19, in which Holland plays duets with some of the biggest names in music, including Dire Straits’ Mark Knopfler, Van Morrison and Eric Clapton.